Aussies made to fight all the way

WALES captain Dewi Lake scored two tries from lineout drives but it wasn't enough to prevent his side crashing to their ninth consecutive defeat and give Australia their first win at a rainy Melbourne since 2017.

- ROGER PANTING

Trailing 17-0 after only 24 minutes, Wales showed terrific heart to make the Wallabies fight to the end and probably deserved to finish in front, but that poor start and a few major errors proved crucial.

Lake said: "We gave ourselves a mountain to climb and losing is always a bitter blow to swallow.

Our driving lineout is a massive weapon for us but our little inaccuracies continue to cost us." Little inaccuracies would be an understatement as some of the errors were of seismic proportions. Liam Williams conceded a soft penalty before another morale-shatterer from him gave Australia their crucial fourth try.

A handling mistake from Cam Winnett gifted Australia their second and too often restarts were a problem with both Winnett and James Botham conceding penalties to allow the scoreboard to tick over against them.

Furthermore, with the game in the balance, Lake was replaced by young Evan Lloyd, with the result that Wales lost the next two lineouts.

Despite these errors, it was still an improvement from Wales. Lake led from the front and there were major contributions from Botham and Taine Plumtree, to ensure that the team weren't wholly incapacitated by the absence of their injured talisman, Aaron Wainwright.

Despite miserable conditions, there was still more movement from the Welsh backs with both wings getting on the score sheet although the centre partnership of Owen Watkin and Mason Grady still failed to convince.

Wales began brightly but they were soon stunned by a brilliant breakaway try to give the Wallabies an early lead. Australia were under real pressure in the own 22 with some scrambled passing creating havoc but a piece of magic from Andrew Kellaway brought the game to life in spectacular fashion.